


roundhouse kicks and a stolen kiss

by ComplicatedPotter



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - Thorne & Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Basically a whole lot of fluff, Beauxbatons!Scorpius, Because that stuff was pure and unadulterated queerbait, Dorky Albus Severus Potter, Dreams and Nightmares, Eventual Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Fluffy Ending, I Tried, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I'll add tags as I go along, M/M, Multi, Not Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Compliant, Overprotective Rose Weasley, Plus ADORABLE SCORBUS HUGS MWAHAHAHA, Post Hogwarts AU, Scorbus, how do i tag???, lmao why is there an au for hogwarts in the literal world of hogwarts i will never understand, transfer student
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-06
Updated: 2018-06-28
Packaged: 2019-02-11 10:08:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12933012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ComplicatedPotter/pseuds/ComplicatedPotter
Summary: Ever since they were young children, Rose Weasley has always been strangely overprotective over her cousin Albus. It is common knowledge amongst the students and staff at Hogwarts that those who approach Albus with less than pure intentions in mind get greeted by her with a solid kick to the groin and a trip to the infirmary. They make a routine of this, and their lives at Hogwarts go by contentedly and overly danger-free. So when the dynamic Scorpius Malfoy transfers from Beauxbatons to Hogwarts and promptly falls for Albus, their lives are turned up-on-end by his intrusion into the bubble Rose had so carefully created around her and Albus.





	1. A Venture Into the Life of Rose Granger-Weasley

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone! This is my first fic written for the Scorbus community (although I have written some dreadfully cringy Jily fics in the past *shudders and flashes back to the dark ages*) and I hope you guys do enjoy it. Reviews would be much loved, although the fact that you've decided to read this is brilliant enough :).

Rose Granger-Weasley was never the type to go down without a fight, either intellectual or physical. After all, with her mother’s brains and her father’s infamous temper, how could she? Fiercely overprotective and completely devoted to her cousin Albus’ wellbeing (“I mean, it’s impossible for me not to be just the _slightest_ bit worried about Al, seeing as the second I take my eyes off him he gets into all sorts of messes,” she would claim whenever someone confronted her about her helicopter-like obsession with keeping her cousin safe), most of her school life at Hogwarts was spent either spent studying or shadowing Albus, mostly both at the same time. 

 

“James Sirius Potter!” she would snap, reading a copy of _‘One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi’,_ “Leave Albus alone; and for Merlin’s sake stop trying to offer him one of Uncle George’s sweets again.”

 

‘Jenkins, you bloody idiot,’ Rose would bellow, letting her eyes stray from a particularly engaging chapter of _‘Hogwarts, A History’_ to give Karl Jenkins a nasty uppercut with her fist, ‘I told you to stop harassing Albus already. Now you’ve gone and made him upset.’

 

A look at her journal would reveal something like this:

 

**Monday:** _Was sent to Professor McGonagall for making Doris bleed out of his ears. Told her it was Doris’ fault in the first place for looking at Albus shiftily, but Old McGee only seemed to get more upset. She gave me detention in the dungeons with Filch. I should probably try not to get detention again; all the time wasted scrubbing grime off rusty cauldrons could have been used to watch over Albus._

 

**Tuesday:** _Ran over Neville in the corridors in my haste to find Albus after his Divination class. Was let off lightly, though the fact that I punched Doris again for talking to Albus wasn’t. How was I supposed to know Doris was only returning a pen he had borrowed from Al? Luckily it wasn’t brought up to Professor McGonagall, but I did have to apologise to that duffer Doris and had 5 points taken away from Gryffindor. The injustice!_

 

...And it continues as such for the remainder of the book.

 

When Rose and Albus had first arrived at Hogwarts (Rose being sorted into Gryffindor; much to her displeasure after realising Albus was in Slytherin) the professors had thought her mother-bird like behaviour was cute, something that she would grow out of in time at Hogwarts. But as the days ticked into months, and the months trickled swiftly into years, they knew that something was off about Rose’s behaviour towards Albus. In fact, it only seemed to get worse as they progressed from year to year, as the older they grew the more likely she could put her unfortunate victims in the Hospital Wing.

 

‘Well, _obviously_ I’ve got to get more violent as we grow older, Al. You only get more and more handsome as you grow, you know, and that means more dubious characters are bound to approach you with thoughts of unholy intention,’ Professor McGonagall once overheard Rose saying to Albus when she walked past them in the hall corridors, whilst Rose was fanning off some dirt from the edge of his collar with the cover of her book. It was then that Professor McGonagall thought it was finally time for an intervention.

 

“Ah, you mean that cousin complex Rose has about Albus?” Ginny had explained, when Professor McGonagall had called her and Hermione in to discuss Rose’s unnatural obsession to keep Albus away from any and all potential dangers, “You see, she can’t help it. She witnessed Albus almost get kidnapped by a gang of rogue post-war Snatchers once, and if not for Rose’s brilliant intervention, I’m not sure if our boy would have lived to tell the tale. It had quite the effect on Rose, however, and I remember her coming over to our house after that incident to check on Albus almost everyday. I suppose that’s when she started sheltering him away from problems, but I don’t think her over-protectiveness is that bad, especially since Albus has got his father’s knack for attracting trouble to him.”

Thus, professors were forced to be more lenient towards Rose’s violent tendencies; much to her delight (and the student body’s horror). 

 

Although one would expect Rose to be unpopular amongst her schoolmates, it could not be further from the truth. She was intelligent and quick-witted, and many found her attachment to Albus endearing when they weren’t on the receiving end of her wrath. Marlene, one of Rose’s closest friends, even encouraged her behaviour, whether by assisting her in piecing together Albus’ school schedule through observation after he had refused to show her his own, or keeping Rose company as she followed Albus around the school. Albus, on the other hand, had only a handful of friends, a result from both his quiet demeanour and Rose’s tendency to drive off students that approached him that she found the slightest bit suspicious. Considering the fact that Albus was in Slytherin, it was rather difficult for him to encounter anyone that wasn’t even a little shady, meaning the people she deemed worthy of talking to him were few and far apart. 

 

Albus, for the most part, was fine with Rose treating him the way she did, accepting her scrupulous sheltering with little say on the matter. He only spoke up when he had to draw the line on some matters, like when she had demanded to see his schedule to know what he was up to every second of the day, or when she wanted him to tell her the Slytherin common-room passcode on a regular basis, so she could check up on him whenever she fancied. Perhaps it was that he had gotten used to it, or that he was simply too shy to speak up to her, but he carried on with his everyday life as normally as an extraordinarily silent Potter-Weasley with a shadow that had a knack for roundhouse kicking his year-mates could. It wasn’t as though he disliked her company either, as Rose was the only person, excluding his siblings and his best mate Greg, that anyone could see Albus talk to with some degree of animation. 

 

Their days at Hogwarts passed in this vicious cycle, and Rose thought that it would be constant at least until the time came to leave school and pursue separate dreams. They were both perfectly content, after all, and it wasn’t as though her defensiveness was completely uncalled for, considering that Albus did have the unfortunate ability to attract trouble like a magnet wherever he went. Yes, it wasn’t that Rose thought that their situation would probably be permanent, she knew it.

 

That was until Fifth Year came about, and in with the season of exams, new relationships and budding aspirations came a new flaxen-haired transfer from Beauxbatons that would change both Rose’s and Albus’s world; whether for the better or for the worse.


	2. As Different As The Sun and The Moon

  Albus Severus Potter considered Rose and himself to be the very definition of polar opposites. Where Rose excelled, Albus was completely and utterly rubbish at. Even when they were nothing but precocious children of five at Grandmother Molly’s dinner parties, the differences in their personality were strikingly different. While Rose would toddle around, charming the adults into giving her sweets and pats on the head, roughhousing with James and Hugo and even playing ‘Wizarding Families’ with Lily and Victorie, Albus preferred to sit with his parents on Grandmother Molly’s squashy couch by the fireplace and simply tell them about his day with solemn eyes and a quiet voice, Harry bouncing Albus on his lap and Ginny nuzzling into Albus’s short, unkempt hair.

 

This was evident even in the way they led their daily life at Hogwarts. She always had some form of company wherever she went, even being accompanied occasionally by that friend of hers Marlene when she escorted him between meals and classes, and whenever she wasn’t looking over Albus she would be surrounded by hordes of friends, relatives and acquaintances, all of them together a generous assortment of red, yellow, green and blue. It was a scene that strangely always reminded Albus of that M&M muggle candy that his Grandfather Arthur absolutely adored, the ones dyed all sorts of colours with artificial food dyes and colourings that once gave James a sugar rush after he gulped down a bowlful of them at their grandparents’ home. He much preferred the peace and calm of solitude, and considered himself to be so socially inept that whenever someone new and unfamiliar talked to him he would get tongue-tied and start fumbling with his words. 

 

His grades were quite good -although they were nothing compared to Rose’s- and he faired particularly well in Potions and Transfiguration, but he was dismal at Quidditch and anything to do with flying on a broom. On their first flying lesson with the Gryffindors, it was long after Rose was whizzing about the field as fast as she could on a school-regulated broomstick that he managed to get the broom to fly up to his hand. Even then, he refused to get on the broomstick (knowing enough from the flying he did at home with James and his father that he was absolutely terrible at it) and started looking uncomfortable enough that Rose promptly got off her own broomstick and whisked Albus away from the field without a word.

 

Rose (although she would never admit it in real life) loved flamboyancy, and absolutely adored spontaneous and explosive dramatics, which was part of the reason why she often egged on and helped James and Fred pull off pranks with pleasure. Albus, on the other hand, lived for the quiet moments late at night with no one for company except the ones he loved, like the time when he painted a portrait of Rose wearing her nighttie in her dormitory in the dead of night when all the others were asleep, when everything was dark but the dimmed Lumos Rose was using to read her book and the bright shine in Rose’s eyes as she skimmed through the thick novel. Or the times where Albus would be shaken awake by James and Lily, and all three of them would sneak past their parents’ room down to the kitchen to sip at steaming cups of hot cocoa, careful to be completely silent as to not wake up their parents. 

 

Sometimes he would confide in Rose, tell her that he was afraid that one day she might realise that someone as worthless and talentless as him would do nothing but drag her down and leave him in the dust as she carried on with her life. Those were the times when Rose would feel an extra-powerful surge of love for her cousin, and reassure him that she would never leave his side, even if Voldemort himself came back and forbade them from sticking together.

 

“Albus, it’s a real pity that you don’t talk nearly as much as the average teenage boy ought to,’ Greg had said once in Fourth Year as they sat together on Albus’s four-poster bed late at night, curtains drawn shut tightly and charmed to mask their voices, “Plenty of girls have come to me asking if I could talk to you for them, though I’ve always rejected their inquiries since I am the very _epitome_ of a brilliant friend.”

 

When Greg had told him that, Albus had dismissed it as nothing but a joke, yet as the year had progressed he did realise that there were an increasingly alarming rate of young and giggly witches turning their attentions to him in the Slytherin common-rooms or the classes in which Rose and him were not together. 

Rose, predictably, had drove most of them off in tears if Albus showed any sign of discomfort or if their advances were getting to be a little too daring, but for the few that were given her stamp of approval he rejected on the spot anyway. He always did it kindly, simply stating that he just didn’t feel the same and that he wouldn’t mind becoming friends at the very least, but maybe the vigilant scrutinization from Rose would already be too much for their fragile lovestruck hearts to handle, because then they would run off sobbing as well.

 

It wasn’t that he meant to make them cry, Albus would later tell Rose after the fifteenth girl that had came up to them ran away with her face buried in her hands, it was just that he had never felt that way about a person at Hogwarts before. The thought of getting close and personal with someone that wasn’t Greg or one of his relatives terrified him, and so he accepted her protection with gratitude and prayed that Rose would always be there to shield him from any unwelcome advanced, female or male. 

 

  It was only when the day came to board the Hogwarts Express for the fifth time came that Albus was struck with the realisation that everything was going to change, and he couldn’t be sure if him and Rose could stay the same ever again. This year, he couldn’t be absolutely certain if Rose would think the changes in their world of solitude would be worth the effort of being his friend, and abandon him to be on his own. And it was all the doing of Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy, a boy who twisted the entirety of Albus’s future with just a flash of his charming smile and a few words with the impact of a million others.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, it's me again. Hope you enjoyed that little look into Albus' point of view and I really hope this chapter doesn't come off as a little draggy and ramble-y. I can promise you the next chapter will definitely be more interesting! As always, I do think the world of any reviews and kudos but thank you so much for reading :)


	3. Of Menacing Forewarnings and Sugary Hot Chocolate

  
  Albus was walking across a busy Muggle London street, the ends of his robes carefully drawn in around his torso as tightly as he could pull them in order not to raise any unnecessary attention from the Muggle pedestrians crowding him. There were all sorts of people jostling Albus as he tried to walk past them unknowingly. Businessmen in well-tailored suits with their cell-phones held to their ears with their shoulders as they rushed off to where their inevitable next meeting laid. Mothers cradling bawling, snotty-nosed toddlers in their arms as they tried in vain to end their crying with promises of ice-creams and treats. Teenagers clumped together like the pigeons on the cement pavement, gossiping away happily about the latest trends and happenings of Muggle celebrities with loaded bags of shopping drooping in their hands.  
  
  
  It was all rather bothersome to go through, seeing as he was only there not for the businessmen, nor the teary-eyed children, but for one person in particular. He turned a few corners, past the obnoxiously bright shoplots imploring him to take a closer look with their cheap neon lightbulbs and colourful signs, and into a darker stretch of the street.  
  
 He walked along the long, shadowy walkway, all the while praying that somehow, by some miracle of chance, that he could find it here. It was only until his feet began to ache and he was out of breath from all the walking that Albus began to lose hope, when all of a sudden he felt it. Albus felt the movement from it in the darkness and although the motion could have been dismissed as one of a stray animal, or a wind-shifted bit of litter, he somehow knew that it was what he was looking for. Albus ran quicker to catch up with it, ignoring his throbbing feet and his pounding chest. It seemed to know that Albus was seeking it, however, and as he started sprinting closer it flashed away as quickly as it had been noticed.  
  
  Discouraged, Albus had just turned around to return back when the darkness of the street began to swallow him up. The pinprick of light from the far-away streets he had passed by earlier disappeared, and he could feel the dark surrounding him. closing up on him until he was aware of nothing but a hauntingly familiar melody crooning at him until even that started fading away.  
  
  
_“J'ai un chaudron plein d'amour chaud et fort,_  
_Et ça bouillonne pour vous._  
_Dites Incendio, mais ce sort n'est pas chaud_  
_Comme ma boisson spéciale de sorcière._  
  
_Oh, de telles sensations attendent,_  
_Parce que, ensemble, nous sommes prêts à continuer._  
_Buvez de mon chaudron plein d'amour chaud et fort,_  
_C'est toute la magie dont tu auras besoin.”_  
  
  Albus jolted awake in his bed at home, drenched in sweat and panting heavily. He sat up sharply and let his head lay on his hands while he took a moment to comprehend the complete absurdity of his dream. On the other side of the room, his brother stirred awake grumpily, awoken by Albus’s sudden jerk of movement. He looked over to where Albus was crouched vulnerably on his bed, visibly shaken, with half the green woolen blanket Grandmother Molly had knitted flopping off a corner of Albus’s mattress, presumably kicked off by Albus in his sleep.  
  
  Instantly, James’s irritation became concern, and he crawled off his own bed to check on Albus.  
  
  ‘Bad dream, Albus?’ James asked him sympathetically, patting him on the back to supply him with even the slightest bit of comfort.  
  
  ‘One of the worst ones in my entire 15 years of being alive,’ Albus replied, groggily rubbing his eyes until they turned red and puffy and taking gulps of air in to slow his rapid heartbeat.  
  
  ‘Hmm...’ James put his hand to his chin and frowned, deep in mock-thought, ‘Even scarier than the one with Mr Cuddles getting eaten by a giant snake?’  
  
  Albus’s hand immediately dived under the blanket to retrieve a threadbare, palm-sized Hippogriff toy (the aforementioned Mr Cuddles), with wings charmed to softly flutter every now and then before scowling sullenly at James.  
  
  ‘That was when I was seven! You promised not to speak a word of it again, remember?’ Albus started indignantly, before being interrupted by James’s stifled guffaws of laughter.  ‘Yeah, I remember Al, it’s just funny to see you get all riled up once in a while,’ James said between peats of giggles. Albus turned a curious shade of pink before conceding defeat and slumping his head on his brother’s shoulder. They stayed in that position for quite a while, Albus savouring the absolute _peace_ of the moment, until James gasped childishly, got up abruptly and began dusting imaginary dirt off his pyjama pants.  
  
  Albus looked at James in confusion with a furrowed brow, and it wasn’t until James mouthed the word ‘kitchen’ that Albus stood up deftly as well. They both stepped out of the room cautiously and slunk over to Lily’s room to wake her up, and eventually all three of the Potter children were sneaking past their parents in the middle of the night to go to the kitchen.  
  
  ‘Whose turn is it to make the drinks again?’ James whispered, as he tried his absolute best to walk gracefully down the rickety wooden steps of the staircase (though in Albus’s opinion he ended up looking more like a very awkward goose).  
  
  ‘I can do i-’ Albus began, but was cut off by the simultaneous shudders of his two other siblings.  
  
  ‘I think I’d better make them, the last time you did Mum went absolutely ballistic ‘cause of the after-mess,’ Lily said, her points emphasised by James’s furious head nodding.  
  
  An image flashed through Albus’s mind of that faithful day, cocoa powder dusting the kitchen floor like a fine coat of muddy snow, a few milk splatters trailing away from the fridge where Albus had fumbled and dropped the carton and, in the midst of all the mess, three younger versions of themselves with their heads bowed down in shame, and a very cross Ginny with her hands on her hips, her bedhead making her look even more terrifying as she yelled her head off at the three.  
  
  The painful memory had Albus humming his agreement, and he said quickly, ‘The stage is all yours, Lils.’  
  
  After both James and Albus were seated on the plastic chairs, tinted a translucent purple with polkadots of pink, that screamed when someone sat on them too hard (the chairs were given to their parents by Uncle George as a housewarming gift, and were charmed with a particularly strong ‘Wingardium Leviosa’  by Uncle Ron to float in mid-air) with their hands resting on the table, Lily pulled out three ceramic mugs and set them on the kitchen counter-top.  
  
  ‘What’s the special occasion? Not that I’m not happy about all of this, it’s just we’ve rarely done after that incident...’ Lily inquired, while she dumped about half a gallon of milk into a saucepan and cast a Heating Charm on it with her wand.  
  
  ‘Little bro here,’ James said, poking Albus’s side as he said it, ‘Had a pretty bad nightmare.’  
  
  ‘Oh no,’ Lily said worriedly, now emptying almost a whole can of chocolate powder into the milk and stirring rapidly, ‘Don’t tell me it was the one with Mr Cuddles again.’  
   
  Albus bristled and looked at James furiously. Noticing the murderous look on Albus’s face, James promptly asked, ‘Actually, Al, what was your nightmare about?’  
  
  Albus, who was about to begin tirading James about keeping secrets and the bond of family, then shut his mouth and pretended to think over his question. Both James and Lily were looking at him expectantly, the latter completely forgetting about the pan she was supposed to be keeping watch over, which was bubbling and steaming at the surface.  
  
  It wasn’t that he didn’t want them to know the nature of his dream, it was that Albus knew one of them was bound to spill it to their parents in one way or another. Knowing him, his father would probably go mad over it and blow the whole thing out of proportion. The last thing he wanted was one of his father’s Mad Eye Moody-like spotchecks on him again, after Harry had passed out from sleep deprivation doing field duty the first time he spent nights on end simply patrolling Albus’s room. It was after a young Albus began having sleepless nights, afraid the Snatchers would come and take him away in his sleep, that Harry had first started staying awake for nights on end in Albus’s room, and he had only stopped when he fainted on the job and Uncle Ron (then still an Auror) was forced to carry him bridal-style off the battlefield and let the neo-Death Eaters get away scot-free.  
  
  His mother would probably react similarly as well, and one of Albus’s most memorable childhood experiences was of Ginny shoving her wand up the nose of a particularly stubborn reporter who had followed Albus back home after his walk around the neighbourhood. When questioned about it later by Hermione, Ginny had cooly replied, ‘The bloody git was so nosy to begin with, I thought it would be appropriate to break his nose in return.’ It didn’t take much for Albus to realise who Lily’s violent streak had come from.  
  
  ‘I can’t remember,’ Albus lied, even with the recollection of his dreams still fresh in his mind, ‘I just know that it was terrifying, is all.’  
  
  Disappointed at the lack of revelation, Lily grumbled to herself and turned to check on the pan, where it was now boiling over and whistling in a most alarming manner. She poured the cocoa into the mugs with practiced ease and set them on the table. Noticing that Lily had plonked the cup with the most hot chocolate in front of him, he smiled to himself and sipped at it gratefully.  
  
  ‘So, has everyone heard the news about the Malfoy kid?’ James inquired, his mouth full of chalky, sugary liquid. Lily nodded solemnly, as if talking about the cure to dragon-pox instead of whoever this Malfoy was.  
  
  ‘Yup, but with a bit of luck he won’t turn out to be like Malfoy Senior. Isn’t he supposed to be in France though?’ Lily replied, lowering her voice and inching her polka dotted chair forwards. Meanwhile, Albus’s head was spinning in confusion. New kid? Malfoy Senior? _France?_  
  
  ‘Hang on, what’s a Malfoy?’ Albus asked, eyebrows furrowed in deliberation. Lily immediately stopped her ramblings to dramatically slam her mug on the table, chocolate liquid sloshing over the rims, and to stare at Albus disbelievingly.  ‘You’re telling me you don’t know about the Malfoys, of all things?’  
  
  Now that he thought about it, Albus could faintly recall a lesson by Professor Binns in his third year about the ‘Sacred Twenty-Eight’ and their roles in the Second Wizarding War, and the mention of a Malfoy here and there.   ‘The Malfoys were… important wizards, I suppose?’ Albus said weakly, to Lily and James’s unimpressed looks.  
  
  ‘Did the Snatchers hit your head on the pavement while they were trying to take you away? I can’t believe you don’t know who the Malfoys are. Even I know, and I’m loads younger than you!’ Lily began, hitting her fists on her chair and making it yell loudly ‘Oi, watch it!’ in protest.  
  
  ‘Lils, that might be going a little too far-‘ James began, only to be interrupted by her dramatic kicks of the table.  
  
  ‘Who were the Malfoys, you ask? They were only one of the most notorious wizarding families of the 19th and 20th century!’ Lily started, James and Albus giving each other twin looks of despair as they scrambled to keep Lily’s voice down. ‘Of course after Mouldytort’s defeat, they fled the country and limped off to France instead. Probably to escape the scathings the Malfoy name received, mind you. The head of the Malfoy family, Draco Lucius Malfoy, is literally Dad’s worst enemy, Albus!’  
  
  Considering how early in the morning it was, Lily’s voice appeared to have risen about a couple million decibels in volume at her last remark. James desperately attempted to silence Lily by shoving her lukewarm mug into her mouth, while Albus looked around nervously and fidgeted with the ends of his unruly hair.  
  
  Trying to placate, Albus whispered urgently, ‘Yes, Lily, I get that I’m a slow, idiotic excuse for a Potter. Now, will you please pipe down before Mum or Dad come down and check on us?’ However, Ginny’s claim that Albus had a penchant for attracting trouble must have had some truth in it, as it was no sooner than he had said it when a familiar messy head of hair popped out from behind the corridor wall.  
  
  ‘Now, what’s all this about my worst enemy?’ Harry inquired sleepily, dragging his bedroom slippers across the kitchen tiles as he rubbed his eyes with vigour. Albus and James froze up, but it was no sooner that James had opened his mouth to make up an excuse when Lily hurled herself into Harry’s arms with the force of a Hungarian Horntail. There was an audible thud when her head slammed into Harry’s chest, and Albus winced on his father’s behalf.  
  
  ‘Oof, easy there Lily-Bear, I’m not as young as I used to be. I appreciate the lovely wakeup-call, but what’s all this about? It’s only-’ Harry said, slurring his words as he squinted doubtfully at the kitchen clock, ‘Three in the morning.’  
  
  He collapsed heavily onto a particularly short-tempered chair, which bristled up and opened its plastic mouth to scream before being cut short by Harry’s threatening ‘Hey, watch it, plonker.’  Harry then muttered something under his breath about how ‘It was too early in the morning for the bloody chairs of all things to be yelling’, and how ‘Ron was very much aware about how much Harry hated the rubbish things, which was why he never came around to fixing them anyway, the git.’  
  
 ‘Harry James Potter, are you aware that one of your own sons, your own flesh and blood, a boy you’ve nurtured from the womb, is totally and completely oblivious to who your long-term rival Draco Malfoy is?’ Lily said, completely ignoring what her father had said, tapping her finger on the kitchen-top counter the way Ginny did whenever she was particularly cross at someone.  
  
  Harry grabbed the mug closest to him (which turned out to be Albus’s, much to his annoyance) and took a long drink from it. He then shot James an accusatory gaze. ‘James, how could you not even recognise the bane of your very own father’s existence. Words cannot even begin to describe how utterly disappointed I am in you,’ Harry began, weighing down his every word with flat disapproval. ‘You haven’t just let down six years of magical education. You’ve let down the Potter name as well.’  
  
  ‘Wrong son, Dad,’ Lily deadpanned, exasperated. Harry scratched his nose thoughtfully and sniffed, pushing Albus’s mug back to him.  
  
  ‘Well, if it’s Albus,’ Harry began, ‘I’ve got no reason to be upset then.’ He pushed his askew glasses back up the bridge of his nose, amidst James’s outraged spluttering and whines of injustice, as well as Albus’s and Lily’s suppressed giggling.  
  
  ‘Speaking of the Malfoys, I heard from the Head of the Floo Network Authority that they’ve requested a Floo from their home in France to England for Draco Malfoy’s kid. Scorpius, I think his name was. I’m rather sure he’s here to stay as well, judging by the ludicrous amount of luggage his house-elves were sporting. Last time I heard from the Malfoys, Draco Malfoy’s wife passed away, so try and be nice to Scorpius and offer him help if he’s at Hogwarts, alright?’ Harry said, inching backwards on the squeaking floating chair to punctuate his long monologue.  
  
  James rolled his eyes and pushed his legs against the counter. ‘C’mon, Dad, they’re Malfoys. I don’t think they can even feel, let alone be sad about anything,’ he responded dismissively, grinning at his father lazily. A sharp stab of sympathy for the boy James had talked so dismissively about struck Albus, feeling inexplicable annoyance build up in his head.  
  
  Harry must have read Albus’s thoughts exactly, because he swivelled his head in a sort of imitation of being vigilant and looked at James sharply.  
  
  ‘Just because Scorpius is a Malfoy doesn’t mean he can’t feel anything. I thought prejudice was beneath you, James Sirius Potter.’  
  
  ‘Fine, sorry. I guess.’  
  
  Albus suspected that part of his father’s sensitivity to the topic was the fact that a mother’s death had been brought into it.   The atmosphere hung over awkwardly for a few seconds, which soon stretched unknowingly into a few minutes. Albus stared into his cocoa sullenly, swivelling the cold liquid his cup around. Awkward silences were the worst kind of silences, and they always left a bitter taste on Albus’s tongue.  
  
  Albus’s thoughts were interrupted by his father standing up abruptly and almost stumbling onto the floor. He murmured something about the ruddy chair being uncomfortable on purpose and stretched inertly.  
  
  ‘Well,’ Harry said conclusively, ‘I’d better be going back to sleep. Your mother’s going to kill me if she finds out I’ve been keeping you guys company instead of stopping you.’  
  
  Lily pouted and looked at him pleadingly. ‘Come on, Dad, we won’t mind if you stay a little longer,’ she said, her voice on the verge of becoming a whine.  
  
  Harry smiled and looked at her fondly, and said ‘No can do, Lily-bear, I was only down here because your mum heard a crash, that’s all.’  
  
‘Good night-’ Harry started.  
  
 ‘Morning,’ James corrected.  
  
  ‘Morning, sorry,’ Harry said, ‘You ought to be getting some rest; we’re going to Diagon Alley for your new schoolbooks later.’  
  
  With that, he slipped on his bedroom slippers, and started to shuffle sluggishly back to his room.  
  
  ‘Wait!’ Lily burst out, a last-ditch attempt to keep her father talking, ‘What are you going to tell mum about the crash?’  
  
  ‘Oh,’ Harry said thoughtfully, ‘I’ll just tell her the cat knocked over something.’  
  
  ‘Dad, we don’t have a cat,’ Lily deadpanned, playing with her scarlet locks of hair and staring at him like he was insane.  
  
  _‘Oh,’_ Harry said once again, now with more emotion behind the word, ‘I’ll figure something out. Good night everyone.’ By the end of his sentence, he was already traipsing up the stairs and ruffling his own bedhead.  
  
  ‘Morning,’ James started once more, but he was already gone.  
  
  All the three Potter children stared at the steps disbelievingly before bursting into silent sniggers.  
  
  ‘I guess we’re going to go Diagon Alley tomorrow; with a bit of luck we’ll manage to convince Mum to get some new kitchen chairs, or we might even see his Lord and Saviour himself, Scorpius Malfoy,’ James said, almost completely disregarding what his father had lectured him on. Lily, finding this extraordinarily funny, broke into another fit of giggles as Albus rolled his eyes.  
  
  ‘I dunno, I have a feeling we will,’ Albus said, and even he wasn’t sure whether he was talking about the chairs, or Scorpius Malfoy.  
   
  
 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I know I haven't updated in almost half a year, and I'm really sorry for that... School's really taken a toll on my leisure time. Luckily I managed to squeeze this out before finals. I hope you enjoyed this chapter; with an enormous word count as compensation!


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